Scan barcode
amelianotthepilot's reviews
722 reviews
Once Upon a Broken Heart by Stephanie Garber
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
i loved this silly little book
its a unique little YA fantasy full of classic tropes and i ate it up
its for the disney girlies, the once upon a time girlies, the vampire girlies, the peasant/royal girlies
I love how it plays around the idea of fantasy kingdoms and has all the classic Disney fantasy vibes of baroque fancy colorful buildings and towns with friendly bakers and neighbors and evil step family with orphaned naive heroic girls who think they'll be saved. I loved how the MC is that classic damsel in distress believing in wishing on stars and true love and I can't wait for her to be slowly crushed by the realization that there is no prince coming to save her lol
It was also super fast-paced which was fun and also very solidly in the area of "YA" its clean romance with fun little silly kisses and romance.
I thought it was perfectly tropey with interesting world-building. Classic tropes include: peasant/royal, hurt/comfort, enemies-to-lovers, forced proximity, miscommunication, etc
The world-building was a mix of classic fairytale fantasy kingdoms with pretty ball gowns and princely looks with some magic sprinkled in. I liked the Fates aspect which essentially functions as Gods but have tarot cards vibe base.
not gonna lie when I say I picked these up for the beautiful (UK) covers but stayed for the dumb tropes
that had me kicking my feet and giggling all the way through 10/10
its a unique little YA fantasy full of classic tropes and i ate it up
its for the disney girlies, the once upon a time girlies, the vampire girlies, the peasant/royal girlies
I love how it plays around the idea of fantasy kingdoms and has all the classic Disney fantasy vibes of baroque fancy colorful buildings and towns with friendly bakers and neighbors and evil step family with orphaned naive heroic girls who think they'll be saved. I loved how the MC is that classic damsel in distress believing in wishing on stars and true love and I can't wait for her to be slowly crushed by the realization that there is no prince coming to save her lol
It was also super fast-paced which was fun and also very solidly in the area of "YA" its clean romance with fun little silly kisses and romance.
I thought it was perfectly tropey with interesting world-building. Classic tropes include: peasant/royal, hurt/comfort, enemies-to-lovers, forced proximity, miscommunication, etc
The world-building was a mix of classic fairytale fantasy kingdoms with pretty ball gowns and princely looks with some magic sprinkled in. I liked the Fates aspect which essentially functions as Gods but have tarot cards vibe base.
not gonna lie when I say I picked these up for the beautiful (UK) covers but stayed for the dumb tropes
that had me kicking my feet and giggling all the way through 10/10
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death of parent
Minor: Body shaming, Toxic relationship, and Toxic friendship
Shadow Kiss by Richelle Mead
4.0
2024 (4 stars): Yet again another banger. In this book Rose and Lissa figure out more Spirit things with Adrian and Rose and Dimitri's relationship furthers while Strigoi attacks become even worse and worse leading to a big cliffhanger battle at the end. Now Rose is being plagued by ghosts and it's affecting her focus and she's left with a terrible mission at the end.
2014 (5 stars): This series is seriously getting better with each book.
The ending of this book is devastating but the Cabin Scene almost makes it worth the pain-but not fully. So many great things happened in this book and so many emotional things and ROMITRI. thats it. thats all you need to know. go read this book.
2014 (5 stars): This series is seriously getting better with each book.
The ending of this book is devastating but the Cabin Scene almost makes it worth the pain-but not fully. So many great things happened in this book and so many emotional things and ROMITRI. thats it. thats all you need to know. go read this book.
Frostbite by Richelle Mead
4.0
2024 (4 stars): This sequel certainly doesn't fall to second-book syndrome. This book features the only moment I really vividly remembered from this series which is when Rose meets Adrian at the ski resort. In this book, Rose and Lissa having narrowly escaped last year and now learned more about their connection, try to better figure out their situation and skills. The Strigoi attacks are getting worse though so the school decides to bring all the students to a remote ski resort for the winter vacation.😂 An introduction of new love interests for Rose, Adrian a rich older royal Moroi who is fully enamored with her, and Mason her best friend Dhampir classmate, but her relationship with Dimitri evolves further. When Mason finds out about a group of Stigoi located nearby he leads a small group of students to defeat them only for it to be a complete mess.
2014 (5 stars): This sequel was even better than the first book! I hope this series continues to have exciting twists and turns in the lives of guardians and vampires.
2014 (5 stars): This sequel was even better than the first book! I hope this series continues to have exciting twists and turns in the lives of guardians and vampires.
Godkiller by Hannah Kaner
3.5
a fun dnd style high fantasy story with interesting world-building. I loved that we got so much diversity and disability representation, the book was queer and had a physically disabled main character and characters using sign language.
The story follows four characters brought together on one quest, Kissen grew up in a coastal town that worshipped the sea god but when the sea was not providing any longer the townspeople sacrificed her and her family to the fire god leaving her badly scarred and missing a leg. Years later she is now a grown woman and has made a life as a god killer, a sort of mercenary hire that kills off local problematic gods since the King has since banned all gods after ~the war~. Meanwhile Inara, has a god problem. She is a young highborn teen who has somehow become attached to a small hare-like god, Skedi, the god of white lies. They seek Kissen's help in becoming detached from each other without killing either Inara or the god. On their journey to the old lands, they end up on a travelling group with Elogast, a former King's knight now turned baker. After a series of unfortunate events in the royal family, his best friend and charge became the King and they went to battle together against the gods, but after the war, Elo quits his post and retires only for the King to come knocking on his door one night to ask for assistance for an old friend, and of course, loyal Elo will do anything for him.
i don't really know why there were POV switches since the characters were mostly all together the whole time, I also felt that the different POVs all had similar sounding voices so it was hard to tell apart. I think maybe it would have been better from an omnipotent 3rd person POV.
I also felt that the plot was maybe not the most interesting story, I was more curious about Kissen's backstory and also the war story. I was more interested in how these character's got here. The plot we got was very obvious
although the story had various queer characters and two of the main characters were bi, ?it somehow felt like queerbaiting? we love bi rep but i feel like lesbian rep is so far and few between and was excited when it seemed the MC was lesbian- I've never been disappointed until now for a character to turn out bi lol. Also the king and Elo seemed really homoerotic just saying...😂
The story follows four characters brought together on one quest, Kissen grew up in a coastal town that worshipped the sea god but when the sea was not providing any longer the townspeople sacrificed her and her family to the fire god leaving her badly scarred and missing a leg. Years later she is now a grown woman and has made a life as a god killer, a sort of mercenary hire that kills off local problematic gods since the King has since banned all gods after ~the war~. Meanwhile Inara, has a god problem. She is a young highborn teen who has somehow become attached to a small hare-like god, Skedi, the god of white lies. They seek Kissen's help in becoming detached from each other without killing either Inara or the god. On their journey to the old lands, they end up on a travelling group with Elogast, a former King's knight now turned baker. After a series of unfortunate events in the royal family, his best friend and charge became the King and they went to battle together against the gods, but after the war, Elo quits his post and retires only for the King to come knocking on his door one night to ask for assistance for an old friend, and of course, loyal Elo will do anything for him.
i don't really know why there were POV switches since the characters were mostly all together the whole time, I also felt that the different POVs all had similar sounding voices so it was hard to tell apart. I think maybe it would have been better from an omnipotent 3rd person POV.
I also felt that the plot was maybe not the most interesting story, I was more curious about Kissen's backstory and also the war story. I was more interested in how these character's got here. The plot we got was very obvious
although the story had various queer characters and two of the main characters were bi, ?it somehow felt like queerbaiting? we love bi rep but i feel like lesbian rep is so far and few between and was excited when it seemed the MC was lesbian- I've never been disappointed until now for a character to turn out bi lol. Also the king and Elo seemed really homoerotic just saying...😂
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Death, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Grief, Sexual content, Abandonment, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Death of parent, Suicide attempt, Injury/Injury detail, and Suicidal thoughts
Nimona by ND Stevenson
3.5
I really enjoyed this comic but watched the move after and actually enjoyed the movie far more. I think the comic is cute vibes, interesting world-building, and characters but leaves a lot of the story threads unresolved and what the movie has changed and rebuilt really added to the story positively. very cute story overall though i loved the medieval but slight technology vibes with trans/queer metaphors
Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross
5.0
ughhhhh this book had me punchin walls and kicking blankets it was so cute
Iris Winnow has won a writing competition and although she didn't finish school because they ran out of money she now has the opportunity to become a columnist at a leading newspaper in the city. However, her academic rival, Roman C Kitt, is a wealthy git who seems to do everything in his power to annoy her and is her only competition for the columnist role.
*stefan voice* This book has everything: rivals to lovers, austen-esque letter exchanges, the missed important letter trope, 1940s city vibes but with a magical twist, a rich boy not allowed to pursue his true love since shes poor, a poor girl struggling to get by but not letting anyone know or help, a WWI-esque war, and a god problem with persephoneXhades vibes.
Iris Winnow has won a writing competition and although she didn't finish school because they ran out of money she now has the opportunity to become a columnist at a leading newspaper in the city. However, her academic rival, Roman C Kitt, is a wealthy git who seems to do everything in his power to annoy her and is her only competition for the columnist role.
*stefan voice* This book has everything: rivals to lovers, austen-esque letter exchanges, the missed important letter trope, 1940s city vibes but with a magical twist, a rich boy not allowed to pursue his true love since shes poor, a poor girl struggling to get by but not letting anyone know or help, a WWI-esque war, and a god problem with persephoneXhades vibes.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Grief, Death of parent, Blood, War, Vomit, and Alcoholism
Blood Promise by Richelle Mead
1.0
2024 (1 star): This is such a drastic turn from the first three. The first three books were a fun little YA adventure with wild dramatic twists in each one. This book features a random trip to Russia with an idealized abusive relationship. 0/10
The plot follows Rose now in Russia pursuing Dimitri but first, she meets Sydney a human alchemist and Dimitri's entire family as well as an older Russian spirit and shadow-kissed couple. I yet again think this could've been a great Sapphic bodyguard trope story but alas. This book was so frustrating as for some reason we go against all of Rose's personality traits and she becomes a drugged-up Stockholm syndrome girlie. AND YET SHE STILL LOVES HIM this is not it guys
2014 (3 stars): I really didn't like this one as much as the first three in the series. I don't know whether or not my impression of the book was effected by my stress from the school work and musical that my show is putting on or not but I really just didn't like this one. It felt wrong and was sad throughout pretty much the entire thing.
The plot follows Rose now in Russia pursuing Dimitri but first, she meets Sydney a human alchemist and Dimitri's entire family as well as an older Russian spirit and shadow-kissed couple. I yet again think this could've been a great Sapphic bodyguard trope story but alas. This book was so frustrating as for some reason we go against all of Rose's personality traits and she becomes a drugged-up Stockholm syndrome girlie. AND YET SHE STILL LOVES HIM this is not it guys
2014 (3 stars): I really didn't like this one as much as the first three in the series. I don't know whether or not my impression of the book was effected by my stress from the school work and musical that my show is putting on or not but I really just didn't like this one. It felt wrong and was sad throughout pretty much the entire thing.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Murder, Rape, Kidnapping, Classism, Violence, Blood, Grief, Toxic friendship, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic relationship